


drosophila

by Amorpheous, orphan_account



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, M/M, Self-Destruction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-19
Updated: 2012-08-19
Packaged: 2017-11-12 12:01:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/490737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amorpheous/pseuds/Amorpheous, https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Standby-mode is over; self-destruction is on; Long-term Somnacin abuse makes Arthur forget about himself (and all he ever wanted to be).</p>
            </blockquote>





	drosophila

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Losing Buildings](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/10995) by Amorpheous. 



**Drosophila**

is a genus of small flies, belonging to the family Drosophilidae, whose members are often called "fruit flies" or more appropriately (though less frequently) pomace flies, vinegar flies, or wine flies, a reference to the _characteristic of many species to linger around overripe or rotting fruit_.  [taken from [wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drosophila); italics by yours truly]

**i.**  
“You’ve been blessed with the worst, kid.”

Arthur couldn’t agree more; with his lungs still cramping and hurting, his mouth dry and his thoughts angry. A cold stethoscope on his back, shivers running down his spine of (exactly) _fear_. “You are allergic”, the doctor said, black moustache and dark eyebrows.  
 _Al-ler-gic_.  
At that time the word made little to no sense, but there was pain attached to it, so Arthur forced himself to remember. _Death_ , a big word with few letters, (especially D that he had just learned in class) seemed closer when you have no real perspective of how obedient a body can actually be.

Allergic to _pineapple_ , and that’s how you form your arch enemy.

***

20 years later, Mal laughs at him when he starts to cough, red spots forming next to his top lip. “How could you forget?”, she taunts him, in the friendly-afraid way that only women are able to and wipes his mouth with a tissue. _Pineapple parfait_. “You can’t die”, she tells him, “it was only one bite and we need you, right?”  
Cobb nods faintly, his fingers slightly shaking under the table. The table’s cover feels thick and hot under his thumb.

(That’s how French dessert introducing goes well, except that Arthur very seriously and very ignorantly couldn’t grasp how blank his mind had become for one or two seconds. Completely void, only the feeling of moving his limbs stayed.)

He didn’t forget. He dismissed the thought, oh _well_ , but the pressure inside stayed. He didn’t. (Or did he?)

“Yeah”, Arthur replies. He looks down and swallows slowly. “Yeah.”

**ii.**  
This is first time Arthur wakes up lost and it will leave him damaged:

Cobb talked to him, in his memory all friendly and nice and concerned ‘blah blah _inception_ blah blah’, but he can’t think of actual words. He knows Yusuf cracked a joke, something with him tripping and chairs, and Arthur remembers laughing and locking the doors after everyone left, the key was heavy in his hand and - ?

Arthur sucks in air, exhales into his palms and decides he’s drunk. Cidre must have lifted him off his feet, hence the sour, sweet taste in the back of his mouth.

That doesn’t necessarily explain why he doesn’t remember getting here, leaning on the nearest wall, eyes snapping open-

His blazer, so far, is the only thing missing; money and coins are still in his trouser’s pocket, id still duct-taped to his right shoe’s insole, key-chain still connected to his belt. So far he’s got everything, at least.

He’s dizzy, his head hurts. He feels sweaty and tired to the very last bone. Stepping forward, he braces himself on the wall, leaning over to see his reflection in a large glass front. There’s a dark spot right above his eyes. He runs his fingers once through his hair and presses himself up, away from the wall.

(He leaves bloody fingerprints on a bus stop.)

He has seen this avenue before. Shops after shops, all bright lights and Ariadne told him how to pronounce-

“Champs-Élysées”, he figures and heads straight for the metro.

He doesn’t freak out, not even once when people stare at him. He doesn’t pay attention, because this, this mess right here is still manageable, the alcohol is left to blame. The aftermath, right now, doesn’t exist. Not permanently.

This is not important. Inception is. (Getting Cobb home.)

***

There is something in the back of his mind, between calculations and needs, something that blocks the _sparks_. He feels slow and unreliable.

They’ve been discussing Ariadne’s mazes for hours, going back and forth over every little detail. The sheer amount of forced safety was wrong, in his opinion, _inflexible_ , but Ariadne claimed they needed more static defenses. Ariadne said ‘panic room”, Arthur said ‘bunker’ and then they agreed on the latter.

The bunker is safe, for now.

And he’s still not entirely sure why Eames wanted to come with him (except for adding decorative crap, “I want a nice bunker!”). Or why this feels like a ménage à _deux_ (instead of trois, because Ariadne is entirely somewhere else), beyond talking and all that stuff.

“I’ve always wondered”, Eames started, very shortly after they entered the lowest part of the dream, “why you have such a bloody soft spot for discipline.”  
Arthur doesn't feel like getting teased, or with having words come out of his mouth, to begin with.

“No, honestly. Thank God you weren’t born in the Thirties", he states ever so calmly, "or it wouldn’t be so kinky.” His eyes fixed on the ceiling and Arthur connects the new ventilation system.

“Nazi references? Seriously, Eames? I thought you’d be better than that.” Arthur smiles to himself. He moves forward, the brilliant metal turning into rusty iron, strong, massive screws holding the plates together. (But his heart still skipped a beat, the direction they’re heading, there’s only chaos left.)

“Obviously not. Playing with dirt is nice, once in a while” - And Arthur stopped, instantly, frozen on the stop. _Cobb_ ’s voice. Fucking forger.

“What the fuck, Eames?!” It was supposed to come out annoyed, but he’s cracking, the flesh beneath his bottom teeth gone numb by now.

Eames looks at him, smiles, _Cobb_ smiles at him, hips tilted, nails scraping along the iron walls. “Arthur, in this state you’re completely useless”, Eames laughs at him, all teeth and fangs and promises broken with honesty. “I’m just practising.”

Arthur stays silent. (It’s enough that his insides are already reacting on false alarm. There’s longing, longing he can’t control.)

“Don’t judge.” Hands sarcastically thrown up, this is exactly how things are not supposed to be, raw and hard and unpredictable.

One second, it’s all wrong, it’s too _Eames_ too bossy, too straight forward, carnival and trickery around the edges. The next, it’s clean and soft, a gaze that’s _Cobb’s_ only, he’s breathing _like_ him.

“Change back!” Arthur charging forward, but he doesn’t even know why he’s _so_ angry. “Immediately!” Eames, of course, doesn’t.

“Did I step on your toes?”, he snarls and gets closer.

And then, just like that. “I _miss_ you.”

(The way the vowels roll off his tongue, the timing, it’s 99% Cobb and Arthur, in panic, locks ‘Me too’ deep down inside his bones, further away than he can reach himself.)  
Lips in a thin line, Arthur is biting, chewing on his own tongue.

“Your appreciation of the finer arts is so flattering, thank you.”  
Eames grabs Arthur’s wrist and twists it, only slightly. Arthur doesn’t fight back.

“See, it’s like this”, Eames explains, nails digging into skin, “I’d let you, just to see you accept yourself being weak.”

“Shut up, Eames.”  
(And he’s right, he’s too right and it stings. Arthur doesn't want to think about _these_ things.) Focusing on his name is easier than looking right through Cobb, details, everything is details.

“No, really. I get that this could be the only way for me ...”, there is smoke curling beneath neon lights, “... and you.”

“You’re not him”, Arthur tries weakly. “You aren’t Cobb.”  
Eames laughs again, a deep and loud laugh, from the bottom of Cobb’s heart; the one that he uses when he hugs James and Phillipa. “I’m not?”

“You don’t smell like him.” The rational part of Arthur still wants to argue, to discuss this to death and bury it with over-the-top constructed reasons and burn it in doubt. (Holding in his next breath.)

“I don’t? I guess I missed that”, Eames shrugs and moves away, “I suppose that’s what other people call mercy.” It isn’t even daring, it’s plain callous calculation: He winks.

(Arthur dreams up a shotgun and aims for the face.’ _Mercy_ ’, he figures.)

***

Cobb is screaming at him.

He’s never been good with him like this. (Maybe he isn’t good at all.)

And the worst thing is-

He knows he didn’t miss it, he even knows where his notes on _this_ Robert Fisher lay, perfectly safe for everyone else. He knows how the paper smells and he knows how his pen’s ink works.  
But when he tries to memorize the content, the actual content, the letters turn, the pages full of ‘xxx’ and black stripes.

He simply forgot; Level 3, highly advanced militarized subc., adaptive, requires heavy stf.  
No, the worst thing is-

It seems so far away, he isn’t even able to feel sorry.

**iii.**

The second time Arthur wakes up lost will leave him paranoid:

He smells cookies. Not in the ‘fresh out of the oven’-way’, but in the ‘someone made cookies today’.

It takes another second of dark wood beneath his feet, burgundy carpet and half closed curtains to make out that he’s standing in Cobb’s living room.

The distance between Arthur’s apartment and Cobb’s house is a about ten miles, if you draw a straight line on the map.

“What are you doing here?”

Arthur spins around, nearly falls flat, only to see James standing there. He’s holding his teddy bear in one and a glass of milk in his other hand.

“Why is your suit so wet, Arthur?”, he asks sleepy.

***

He managed to get home. (He leaves the cab like a dying man.)

The conclusion is quiet: he strips himself naked and puts on a new shirt and a pair of boxers.

Arthur lays down on his bed, perfectly quiet, perfectly still.

He hears his refrigerator in his kitchen, faint city noises, the wind outside. (He hears anything except himself.)

It isn’t something oh-so-unexpected: He needs fixation, he does need it. It’s only logic. He isn’t safe anymore, on his own.

***

He closes the handcuffs, more tighter than necessary. (And simply hopes his hand hasn’t turned blue in the morning.)

***

There’s light to his left, only flickers, a strange pattern of lines. He wakes up with silent scream, fingers all clenched and tight, trying to push him up, upwards, but his nails scratch helplessly on tiles, he bumps his head on something and it fucking hurts, something fell over in the process and then - the cold rush of adrenaline, the paranoia kicking in: Arthur is scared.

Still trying to get to his feet, he forces himself - _there’s blood on the floor on his shirt on his arm_ \- to calm down, just enough to realize he’s fighting his kitchen counter.  
There is this one spot, the one spot that always smells like burnt onions because Arthur hasn’t cooked in forever and the last time he forgot he was doing _somethingsomething_ in a pan with rice.

He hits the light switch, more force than necessary and looks down, no guts spilling, no stab wounds, he’s alright, he’s okay except for his left wrist. Hand cuff absently danging from his arm, marks craved into his flesh from pulling too hard. The metal is fucking crushed.

There’s wood on the other side where his bed was supposed to be. His _bed_.

He stumbles to his bedroom door, sweat soaked and ache-

There’s blood on his blankets, but he figured so far. Pieces of wood, his headboard is kicked in, it has _fucking_ bite marks on it. Feathers everywhere.

Arthur drops to his knees, his head, his world spinning, “Maybe it’s rabies?”, he says to himself and his hands starts shaking and he laughs, _laughs_ , out of control and loud.

He is going insane and he knows because his bones are humming. (It’s only a start.)

***

Arthur is not stupid.

He stays awake for the next three days, living off caffeine and pure self-control. He tried every single brand of energy drinks in the radius of twenty miles and follows a tight schedule. No time to get distracted, no time to fall asleep.

He knows how his carpet changes color at dawn, he knows exactly how his windows reflect light at dusk.

It makes him happy, in a very silly, very naive way: His new sense of purpose. Saving himself from _something_ , saving the others from _himself_.

He reads more books than he ever has before, the clock fixed somewhere between three and four a.m. and he takes an ice cold shower by five, by six he’s making fresh coffee (whole beans, directly imported from Jamaica) -

and Mal told him it was ‘ _bol_ ’ and not ‘bowl’’ and he wasn’t supposed to pronounce it like _that_ and he should just shut up and enjoy his café au lait for once while he had the chance. Cobb laughed, _blood and bones don’t belong into lavander fields_ and Mal smiled back, _provence is deadly shabby chic_ ; Arthur felt incredibly whole and

\- and by seven he’s clawing at the walls, trying to calm down.

He’s out of breath, except he hasn’t been running, but his body is heavy, it’s fucking heavy and his legs cramp and itch in all the wrong spots and it _hurts_.

His next move also falls back on: Arthur is not stupid.

The bottles of vodka, the packages of sleeping pills (highest dosage he could get away with), the duct tape; it’s a terrorist's act against himself, he’s too prepared to fight.

Arthur checks his kitchen, his bathroom and then his kitchen, again and decides it’s now or never. While people seem to get away without ten days without sleeping, his nose still hurts from bumping against the door frame, not to mention the bruises from the handcuff-incident (still open red and ugly), and it’s _enough_.

After closing every single curtain, he sits down on his new bed in half-darkness. Clenching and releasing his jaw, teeth tightly pressed onto each other.

This needs to go:

1\. Tape feet to bed  
2\. Tape left hand to left leg  
3\. Pills + Vodka  
4\. Sleep

(He has flushed every last one of his cellphones down the toilet, so he only hopes his apartment doesn’t burn down.)

By the time the guilt kicks in ( _Cobb_ ), he’s already asleep. It’s just another routine.

***

Cobb calls all seven mobile phones. He tries to send an email to twenty of Arthur’s accounts and every single one bounces back.  
He’s tried Ariadne and Saito and Yusuf. (And he’s getting tired.)

In the end, he’s only the tiniest bit bitter (lie!) about “Arthur? He’s right across the room.” and “I don’t think he wants to talk to you.”

Fucking forger. Fucking pointman and his way of working things _away_ instead of _out_. (He knew, he’d beg for another job. A source of ego, to begin with.)

***

They’re in Milan and Arthur is one layer down and can still feel the faint taste of pesto on his tongue. (It feels like he can’t see Italian food for the next few centuries.)

He sits in a typical American diner, 1950, victory rolls and hairspray and pancakes and strawberry milkshakes. His polyester suit is itchy. The air condition is loud and Arthur, for once, regrets having his weapons near by; his skin all sweaty, clinging to the metal of his gun: It’s slippery and unprofessional.

He knows, he feels - it’s pulsating under his skin, under his breath, in steady but large doses - something is wrong, something is fucking wrong but he can’t put his finger on it. Definition is out of reach. (And it isn’t the black moustache sitting above his top lip.)

Eames - wearing fucking roller skates - smacks him across the neck, Arthur drops down without resistance.

“Now would be a good time to run”, he yells at him, all nice and female, “Or never ever, to begin with!”

Arthur hears screams, there’s metal bending at awkward angles and glass breaking.

“What the fuck happened?”

“He didn’t take it well!”

They’re rushing outside, the desert is close.

Arthur takes one look back - lions, a least twenty of them, angry, _blood-lusty_ \- and stops on the spot.

The road, the cacti, the sand, the houses, it goes on for another ten meters and then -

There is white. The purest and perfect white. An infinite amount of it.

Brutally cut directly into the world, it’s an opaque and dangerous wall and Arthur can’t even see if it’s solid or one big hole.

Eames is close to the edge and holds his hand out into the empty space. Arthur can see that his knees are shaking, right above where his cheerleader skirt ends.

“What the fuck ...”, he tries weakly.

His forehead starts burning, bright white pain, the most sincere kind.  
He aims for Eames’ head and shoots, twice, just to be sure. The fragile female body falls forward, slips past the road and down, down, down, down, with a flying trace of brain and blood in the air.

“This. This is the end”, he mumbles, he’s crying underneath. (It feels like it.)

A heavy and strong paw presses him down, his spine cracks.

(They eat him half-consciously.)

***

Cobb nearly chokes on his coffee. Phillipa looks up from the book in her hand - _The Little Mermaid_ , in new bold gold letters - and lets it drop on the table. Dark brown coffee marks are forming on the newspaper on top of it.

James looks at him, very and utterly confused and says: “Daddy, are you alright?”   
Cobb coughs again, once, twice and nods. There are birds chirping outside, it smells like freshly mown grass.

“Of course, Arthur read it to you the other night”, he laughs nervously, “Of course he did.” He feels acid moving up, his throat already hurts.

“And I didn’t like it”, James concludes, “It’s totally girly.” All done with an eye roll and fake disgust in his voice. “It’s so unrealistic!”

“So are knights and dragons!”, Phillipa clenches her fingers into her yellow dress, “But I like it and I don’t care that you don’t like it!”

James pouts and struts out of the room (never hurt a boy’s pride after all!).

“Dad, could you read it to me?”, Phillipa tries carefully, “Anyways?”

Cobb decides: This. Is. Enough. Nonsense. (He’s going to skin him alive.)

He moves a little so Phillipa can sit next to him and starts on the first page.

“[Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as crystal, it is very, very deep... so deep, indeed.](http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/LitMer.shtml)”

(The mermaid smiles back at him, viciously and all-knowing. Because you’re the one who dragged him to the ground in the first place. You clawed at him and forced him to go deeper.)

Cobb tries very hard to breathe steady.

***

It’s three a.m. when Eames calls.

He sounds tired and angry and something weird that Cobb can’t make out.

“He’s going insane.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He’s going insane and he needs help. He fucked up, Cobb, he really fucked up, before he was eaten alive I see you, standing there, watching.”

“I- I ...”

“Fucking help him. He loves you, after all.”

(“Mercy”, Eames figures.)

Cobb drops to his knees and vomits.

***

Arthur leaves and arrives with a blue eye. (Eames’ way to show his gratitude, a kiss with his fist.)

He’s standing his hallway, all fucking jet-lagged and hungry (for life).

He remembers the exact moment, the moment when Saito rubbed his face against the carpet, all omnipresent and smug, the way he smiled knowing.

Arthur can’t remember how his hallway smelled before. He can’t remember how his walls feel. He can’t remember how his living rooms looks like or how coffee from Jamaica tastes.

He grabs a pen and a piece of toilet paper and writes down: “cobb is the only one i can trust my favourite color is blue”.

One big messy sentence, but he’s absolutely sure that there are still things worth dying for (he makes himself believe).

Because he knows he likes blue and he likes Cobb and he knows he’s got enough gasoline down in the cellar to fucking burn his house down.

***

The blanket beneath him is moist, almost wet, but it’s better than nothing.  
(The motel was cheap, after all.)

There’s a click in the line and “Hello?”

“Hey”  
(I burnt my house down.)

“Arthur?”  
(I’m so fucking worried and angry and worried ...)

“Yes”  
(Would you every take me to Limbo?)

“Arthur, where are you? What’s going on?”  
(No. Never.)

“I can’t create anymore.”  
(I would spend my life with you.)

“Oh.”  
(You’re lying. It’s something else.)

“I’ll think of something.”  
(I’m out of fucking options.)

“I want to see you.”  
(I want to see you.)

“I’m getting back to you, in time, I swear, I’ll, I’ll see you, okay? Okay.”  
(I’m scared.)

Arthur puts the telephone down, with surgical care. He breaths in and rips the cable out of the wall. 

The way Cobb’s syllables run down his spine, it’s dangerous. It’s too real, what he’s feeling now, far too away from falling apart. It’s the feeling of truth: He’s ashamed.

(Arthur jerks off in the shower.)

He’s decided. He’s going under. He needs to fix this.

***

He concentrates on an open, urban space with skyscrapers and harsh, straight lines. A huge array of reflections and light. (The last rational hopes.)

The white is watching him. It’s moving, organic and angry. The perfect hunter-prey-relationship.

Arthur is tired. The blue and silver towers and streets are moving, fading, like white noise.

He’s bleeding in the simplest way. It’s streaming down his arms, bright red artery drops on the ground. Swirling, spirals are forming, creeping forward.  
An ocean of lines, of desperate lines with no end. They’re too calm, too decorative, not raw and angry, they’re -

Simply, and awfully tired. He walks with tiny steps, light, but sure.

He lets himself fall off the broken edge, the landscape getting bigger and smaller, like he’s drowning in too much air.

He thinks, “I like blue.” and “I’m so sorry.”

When he hits a part of solid subconscious, his body pops open. (Ripe fruits and flies.)

***

Arthur wakes up with a nosebleed that won’t stop for the next twenty minutes.

***

Arthur decides he needs help. Serious help. (As in google won’t _ever_ work.)  
Very calmly, he calls Yusuf and tells him he’s on his way to Mombasa. He doesn’t even wait for an answer when he closes the door, trying to remember if he turned off the oven and lights.

(He can’t and he feels incredibly guilty.)

***

It’s been 27 minutes since Arthur had started explaining, choosing words carefully, fact after fact until it felt like he was discussing an urban legend, something caused by too much booze and Xanax and want, but it’s not. Because Yusuf hasn’t said anything for 27 minutes straight.

“You probably think I’m gone nuts, am I right?”, Arthur asks almost casually, between blinking. The faded ornament wallpaper blinks back, lazily.

Yusuf actually tries to laugh, wearily and shakes his head. “ No”, he states simply and then-  
“But I’ve seen it before.”

Something cracks. Loud. (Inside his mind, nevertheless.)

“They call it ‘sufuri’”, Yusuf says bitterly, “ _zero_.”

Arthur looks outside the window, focused on nothing, but his head hurts. Somehow. This feels too new, too absolute to change. He isn’t even able to grasp the thing, alone really understand it.

“How do you call it?”, he tries and grows quiet.

Yusuf swallows. His cat is watching him closely, it’s purring.

“Somnacin is destroying your subconscious.”

Arthur remembers, when he was thirteen and a few months old, he had his kiss.

He was visiting his aunt’s farm, all hay and sunshine and too much stones poking into his soles. His cousin's best friend had a sister, a year younger than him and her name was Cheryl.

She always wore something with lace, a t-shirt hemmed with it, white lace tights, headband, anything. They teased her, calling her 'granny' and trying to get her bright white clothes dirty with cherry juice, the special kind that leaves _forever_ -stains. She kissed him when the others couldn't see and said, "I still like you."

Arthur clenches his teeth, his jaw moving and the pins-and-needles come back, a swarm of ants moving underneath the callous skin. “And?”, he whispers.

“Arthur”, Yusuf tries once again but there is no force behind his name, it’s an empty phrase and they both know it. It feels like champagne caused rain all over again, like it’s his fault. “You haven’t been exactly using healthy doses of it, not while I was near, and we both know I don’t need to elaborate. Listen, I’m-”

“Why do they call it ‘zero’?”

Arthur doesn’t answer Yusuf’s unspoken question; it’s bitter confusion.  
He presses his right hand down, harder, until his palm turns white. There’s salt on his tongue. (Like your last words, your last dying wish.)

“Because in sufuri, there’s nothing left. It’s the perfect void.”  
Yusuf gets up and turns around, almost fascinated. This is beyond fucked up, they’re not even close enough to discuss this, they need to _stop_. He starts arranging his books, feeling the old shelves and inhaling dust.

For some reason Arthur thinks of circles, circles and snakes and the one who bites its own tail. _Infinity._ “But I’m not”, he hesitates to use the word, “I’m not- I mean, how’s that even possible?”

“A beast without body, without mercy. They say it rips souls to shreds and feeds on what's left of the victim’s mind.” There’s wooden splinter stuck in his hand, or more precisely in his left hand's ringfinger, second knuckle. (Where did he leave his tweezers?)

“And?” Arthur says for the third time and he feels disconnected from his body. The sensations he’s feeling, breathing, his blood pumping, it feels new and unfamiliar; it makes him sick.

Yusuf leans back, but the shelve stops him. “I’m so sorry.”

But Arthur is already rushing for the door, holding his suitcase close and then, he’s out of sight.

Yusuf doesn’t stop him.

(He could've sworn he smelled grass when he left, except it made no sense; and he saw putti behind his lids, fat smiles, all drenched in white).

“Me too.”

Only the empty echo bouncing off the clean tiles return angrily.

***

Cobb asks, “How’s Yusuf?”  
Arthur tells him, Mombasa is too hot for his own good, the climate _he’s okay_ , no, yes, and perfectly okay and that he’s _actually_ getting better. Cobb, without inhaling twice, tells him to come over.

(It’s worse than ever.)

***

“This is getting too far”, Cobb mutters under his breath and watches Arthur with a mixture of pity and self-loathing.

“You need to stop it because we can’t.” _I can’t._

Arthur looks up, up from the dark wooden floor and inhales. He grabs, he clings so hard to the thought of not surrendering, he feels, no, he know it’s going to kill himself.

“What am I supposed to do?”

“Would you dream with me?”

The question hangs heavy in the room, but before Arthur can answer James calls for his dad.

(They always part like this, before someone demands honesty.)

***

When Cobb sees the white spaces, a slaughtered dream, bits and pieces cracking, breaking down into the abyss, he starts laughing hysterically.

(Because worse, worse you can’t stop. He hasn’t hit bottom and never will, so you never ever will be able to patch this up.)

He is losing Arthur to himself and to himself only.

***

They don’t talk about, quietly- _Sufuri_. They don’t take turns and wait politely until the sentences are finished, until every last vowel is spoken.

But they do stare each other down, down, until the concept of one’s self feels strange and unexpected.

***

It’s three a.m.

Cobb wakes up slowly.

The bright bathroom neon light.

There are drops of blood on the floor, when Cobb gets up, barefoot and walks over.  
Arthur is standing in front of the sink, his head thrown back, a washcloth pressed tohis face, half-soaked in water and blood.

He stands behind him, still space between them. He feels Arthur breathing.

“You’re doing it wrong, you need to let it flow out or it won’t stop”, Cobb says calmly. (He already knows he’s there.)

Washcloth still tightly pressed to his nose, Arthur looks down, just as told.

Cobb touches his neck, lightly and slides his thumb along Arthur’s ear.

***

My name is Arthur.

 

I like blue.

 

I trust Cobb.

 

I _think_.

(At least.)

**Author's Note:**

> I want to thank amorpheous for being such a nice i_reversebang partner ♥


End file.
